Adam Baker - Terminus

Eight hundred miles of darkness and silence. Dripping water. Mournful wind-whisper. Passageways and caverns sealed for ever. A necropolis that would endure long after surface structures collapsed and were subsumed by forest.

A subterranean realm ruled by rats.

Rodents navigated the tunnels in packs. They sought out survivors, the handful of New Yorkers that fled into subterranean darkness to escape ground-level horror. Bewildered refugees stumbling through unlit passageways slowly succumbing to dehydration. Weak. Injured. Maimed by the concussive detonation: the crushing shockwave which burst eardrums, ruptured capillaries, made blood fizz with liberated nitrogen. Victims convulsed, dripped frothing blood from ears and nose as they were subject to massive decompression trauma, like a diver dragged from the depths.

One by one the helpless survivors were overwhelmed by a swarming, seething tide of vermin. Screams echoed through the tunnels as countless yellow incisors sank into flesh.

Rats burrowed into eye sockets, gnawed soft extremities, chewed deep into muscle and viscera.

Bodies quickly reduced to scattered, skeletonised remains.

Rushing water. A rumble like an oncoming train.

Rats scattered and ran. They fled the tidal rush. A rippling stream of dirt-streaked fur. They scurried across rail beds. They scampered along pipe work and ropes of high-voltage cable, looking to reach high ground, looking for air-locked tunnels and chambers that would escape the flood.

Grand Central Terminal. A flame-seared ruin. A cascade of roof rubble had buried each concourse, pulverised the ticket booths and destination board, crushed the information stand and four-faced clock. The 9/11 memorial flag had burned and shrivelled to black melt-drips.

The netherworld beneath the station, the labyrinth of stairways, passageways and ducts, still intact.

Substation Four. A deep-level generator house beneath the ruins of the terminal. A vast dynamo hall. Five hulking rotary DC converters in a row.

Rats infiltrated sub-levels beneath the terminal, but instinctively avoided the generator room. They turned tail rather than explore the long corridor leading to the power house. They reared and shrieked when they glimpsed the rivet-studded entrance at the end of the passageway, the high-voltage zags and danger signs.

The substation doors hung ajar. Impenetrable darkness.

A powerful sentience evolving in shadow deep inside the monumental chamber. A sleepless alien intelligence that pervaded the entire subterranean network, reaching out through the structural fabric of the flooded tunnels.

It sensed an intrusion.

Fresh meat had entered the subsurface system far south at Fenwick Street.

The subway tunnel, lit crimson by flickering flare-light.

Nariko, Cloke and Tombes waded knee-deep across the submerged platform. They kicked through drifts of floating garbage.

‘Walk slow,’ advised Cloke. ‘Don’t splash.’

Nariko held the grab line for stability as they climbed into the boat. She crouched at the prow. She held a floodlight.

Cloke and Tombes sat behind, each with an oar. Tombes wore his battered leather fire hat with a brass RESCUE 4 insignia.

The boat sat low in the water. They pushed away from the platform and began to paddle. Slow, deliberate oar strokes.

Donahue stood at the platform steps, flare held high. She watched them depart.

‘Catch you later,’ shouted Tombes. His voice echoed in the cavernous space.

‘Watch your ass,’ replied Donahue.

The boat headed into the tunnel mouth.

Donahue tossed the flare into the water. It floated, spitting fire for a couple of seconds, then dimmed and died.

Galloway inspected the rusted Coke machine. He pounded the side of the cabinet and checked the return slot for nickels.

Lupe shifted position. She stretched. She rubbed her wrists, massaged cuff abrasions.

‘Sooner or later, you’ll cut me loose,’ she said. ‘How will that feel? When the chains are off and you have to look me in the eye? Whole different ball game.’

‘Think I’m scared? I’ve straightened out a few hard-asses in my time. I know how to deal with street trash like you.’

‘Bronx accent, right? Must have been tough. How many ex-cons lived in your neighbourhood? Bet you spent a lot of time looking over your shoulder, worrying some ex-jailbird with a grudge is going to spot you in a bar and turn his mind to payback. What did you tell people? Did you say you were a plumber or some shit? Did you chain the door each night? Keep a .38 under the pillow?’

‘None of your damned business.’

‘Corrections. Only law enforcement job you can get without an education. The police department turned you down, didn’t they? Thank you for your resume, but due to the high volume of applicants …’

‘Fuck you.’

‘Should have worked at the airport, man. Could have sat on your ass and watched a luggage scanner all day. Easy money.’

‘Think you can get under my skin? I get shit from you lowlives every working day. Scumbags shouting through the bars. Lifelong losers.’

‘Most COs just punch the clock. Do their shift, drive home, pop a cold one. But you love it. I can tell. You’re the type. Tuck your pants into your boots like you’re SWAT. Does it make up for being a short guy?’

‘You’re nothing but noise.’

‘Live for it, don’t you? Pulling on your pads and helmet for a cell extraction. Choke-holds. Beatings. Some juicy pain compliance. You’re nothing without your nightstick, nothing without your keys. The moment they unlock these cuffs, the moment you got no one to push around, you’ll cease to exist.’

Galloway stood over Lupe. He racked the slide of his Remington and jammed the snout against her temple. He twisted the barrel, tried to brand a ring-bruise into her flesh.

‘Keep pushing, bitch. Nobody here but us. Can’t seem to get that into your skull, can you? No cops, no CCTV. Easy equation: you, me, this twelve-gauge. The old law. Simplest thing in the world.’

A sudden, metallic rattle from the entrance gate. Heavy impacts. The groan of stressed metal.

Galloway lowered the shotgun and backed off. He ran across the ticket hall and stood at the foot of the street exit stairs.

‘What’s going on, man?’ shouted Lupe. ‘Are they in? Did they break in?’

Galloway watched hands scrabble at the opaque plastic sheet that curtained the lattice gate.

‘Uncuff me, man. Undo the cuffs. Come on. You can’t leave me chained to a fucking pillar.’

Fingers raked plastic. Blood smears and snagging nails.

‘Shit,’ murmured Galloway.

He ran to the platform stairwell.

‘Donahue.’ His voice echoed back at him. ‘Donahue. Where the hell are you?’

She ran up the steps to meet him.

‘I think we’re starting to draw a crowd.’

The station entrance. Galloway and Donahue in respirators.

‘Four or five of the bastards,’ said Donahue. ‘Guess the gate will hold, for now.’

She pulled back the curtain with a gloved hand.

Galloway took casual aim with his shotgun. He squinted down the barrel at a jawless priest pressed against the gate, reaching, snarling, air escaping a ruptured throat in a series of guttural pig-snorts.

‘Want me to thin them out? At this range I could take two with each shot.’

‘Gunfire would bring more down on us,’ said Donahue. ‘Might as well ring a dinner bell. These creatures are dumb as rocks, but if they hear noise associated with living, breathing humans they’ll crawl through the rubble from miles around.’